The Scientist Rejected Accusations of Plagiarism and Accused NAZYAVO of Unprofessionalism and Double Standards

In his comment to “Ukrainian News”, Acting Rector of the “National University Yuri Kondratyuk Poltava Polytechnic”, Doctor of Sciences (Economics), Professor Volodymyr Onyshchenko accused the National Agency for Quality in Higher Education (NAZYAVO) of double standards and unprofessionalism.

“On the part of NAZYAVO, I see the application of double standards, which in no way contributes to the true cleansing of the scientific community from truly unscrupulous representatives. It became clear that the system for selecting NAZYAVO members is imperfect from the beginning, because it did not include an analysis of the absence of plagiarism in their scientific works and compliance standards of academic integrity. In my opinion, the active fighters against plagiarism must be stopped now, otherwise they will start irreversible processes, as a result of which Ukrainian science will be destroyed,” Onyshchenko said.

In recent years, Ukrainian society has been watching a wave of “plagiarism scandals”. According to the media, the problem of combating academic dishonesty often borders on bullying, and accusations of plagiarism can be used as an illegal tool of influence in the process of competition for certain positions.

Onyshchenko, who was accused of plagiarism, in his comment to the “Poltavshchyna” news resource, made an assumption that his doctoral dissertation had faced someone’s precise interest because of his professional activity. Since the defence in 2002, when he was an ordinary bank employee and part-time teacher at the university, he has not received any claims of academic dishonesty.

The uniqueness of Onishchenko’s case lies in the fact that less than 1% of the text of his doctoral dissertation was recognized as controversial. Moreover, this part of the thesis is controversial in the context of modern requirements, while as of 2002, when the defence took place, the thesis fully complied with the norms in force at that time and contains proper references according to the requirements of that time.

NAZYAVO now accuses Onyshchenko and some other scholars of not citing the sources in all paragraphs of their dissertations which have already been cited primary according to the requirements of earlier times. The main line of accusations and transformation of scientists into "plagiarists" is often built on this absurd plot.

Dates are important, because earlier in Ukraine the concept of academic plagiarism did not exist. And from a legal point of view, in relation to scientists who defended their dissertations before September 2017, accusations of plagiarism cannot be applied.

“Only with the adoption of the Law of Ukraine “On Education” dated 5 September 2017, the concept of academic plagiarism, fabrication, and falsification was properly established at the legislative level, and responsibility for such actions was also provided for. Such an approach is currently being applied to a large number of scientists, which contradicts the provisions of Article 58 of the Constitution of Ukraine, according to which laws and other normative legal acts do not have retroactive effect in time. No one can be held responsible for actions that were not recognized by law as offenses at the time of their commission. NAZYAVO officials are now trying to attract a large number of scientists to responsibility for those actions which at the time of their commission were not recognized by the law as an offense,” explained Mykola Knysh, “Kredo” Law Firm partner and lawyer.

However, Onyshchenko clarified that even when checked by an anti-plagiarism programme, the uniqueness of the text of his dissertation is 99.18%. And the disputed points – less than 1% - are precisely the part where he made references to primary sources not as required by the modern rules for dissertations, but in accordance with the requirements of 2002. According to Onyshchenko, lawyers found plagiarism in 10 out of 21 NAZYAVO members, and in four more NAZYAVO members, the thesis was either not found at all, or the abstracts were posted in violation of the requirements of the law. So, 14 of the 21 members of NAZYAVO can be addressed with a much larger volume of accusations than those with which they have now addressed scholars.

Onyschenko noted that his lawyers warned NAZYAVO members about a conflict of interest precisely because of the numerous facts found by them of non-compliance with the principles of academic integrity. Also, according to Onyschenko, his lawyers have already submitted the collected materials to the National Agency on Corruption Prevention.

NAZYAVO member Lidiia Fesenko, who does not have a scientific degree at all, herself turned out to be a plagiarist twice. Ms Fesenko’s bachelor’s thesis, which she defended in 2018, contains errors on every page, starting with the title page, as well as a large number of plagiarized borrowings, which the media wrote about in 2020. Recently, it became known about confirmed plagiarism in her master’s thesis.

It is interesting that the author of most of the complaints against the dissertations of Ukrainian scientists in most cases is a graduate of Moscow State University named after M. V. Lomonosov, candidate of biological sciences Oleh Smirnov. This is despite the fact that Smirnov cannot be harmed by the dissertations of the scientists he complained about, because he and they have different scientific specializations. He is a biologist, and the objects of his accusations are economists, lawyers, and doctors. In total, Smirnov filed several dozen complaints. He runs a thematic site with ‘black’ and “gray” lists of Ukrainian scientists mixed with politicians who possess scientific degrees. As “Kontrakry” wrote, until January 2024, Oleh Smirnov administered his site on a Russian resource, and in 2021 he published directories in the Russian book publishing holding “Infra-M”.

The work of NAZYAVO members is well paid, but the efficiency and impartiality of the work also remains in question. Recently, the deputy head of NAZYAVO, Ivan Nazarov, applied for the position of judge of the Constitutional Court of Ukraine – at the interview, the advisory group of experts recognized that he did not meet the criterion of high moral qualities.

In view of the above, some experts suggest that the position of individual members of NAZYAVO has signs of bias, unprofessionalism and neglect of their immediate duties.